Thought for the Week

Baby of Bethlehem – who are you?

Some 2000 years ago you were the Christ, but who are you today?

I think of the situation in Bethlehem today with tears in my eyes and frustration in my being. As I think of the baby of Bethlehem of 2000 years ago, homeless and rejected, I think of the many babies who will not grow up in a peaceful land there today.

I think of babies who may well be left homeless when their house is bulldozed illegally and in contravention of international law.

And I want to commend to you this Christmas the Olive Grove Chapel at the Tent of Nations, Bethlehem.

‘We refuse to be enemies’ is the ethos of the Tent of Nations, a farm owned by the Palestinian Christian Nassar family just outside Bethlehem.

The farm is surrounded on all sides by illegal Israeli settlements and is under constant threat of demolition, with the family under threat of eviction.

The Nassar family works the land and lives by that ethos written on a stone as you enter the farm. ‘We refuse to be enemies.’

Through continuing to grow olives, grapes, almonds and various other fruits, as well as hosting work parties, groups and children’s summer camps, the family non-violently resists the moves by settler organisations to remove them from the land which has been owned and farmed by the family for generations.

I also give thanks for those wonderful Rabbis for Peace who act as human shields to protect the Palestinian harvest from vandalism and who work to bring peace.

This Christmas, let us kneel by the Prince of Peace and pray for that day when peace will come in the land of his birth.